Fauré was a pupil of Saint-Saëns and after
having been organist at several churches in Rennes and Paris
he succeeded Eduard Massenet as teacher at the Conservatoire Nationale de
Paris and serving as director from 1905 to 1920.
Musically he is considered as standing between Cesar Franck and Claude
Debussy and his output which often avoids sharp contrasts is comparatively
small. His most famous works are the opera Pénélope, incidental
music for Maeterlinck play Peléas et Mélisande, the ballet suite Masques
et Bergamasques, some chamber music, a Requiem and a multitude of works
for one or two pianos and songs.

Felderhof
studied at The Amsterdam Conservatory violin with Felice Togni and
Hendrik Rijnbergen and theory and composition with Sem Dresden taking his
diploma exams in 1931 and 1933.
Already the next year he was taken on as a faculty member of the Conservatory. The first period lasted till 1954 and the next from 1959 to
1973. During the years 1956 to 1967 he also taught composition,
counterpoint, harmony etc. at Utrecht Conservatory
From 1938 to 1944 he taught violin and conducting at the Amsterdam Volksmuziekschool
after which he became director of the
Toonkunstmuziekschool in Bussum before becoming director of the Amsterdam
Conservatory from 1968 to 1973
Among his works are a Marcia Sinfonica, a sinfonietta, a suite for flute and orchestra, a rhapsody for oboe
and orchestra, chamber music and piano works.

Impression
(Donemus)The piece was written in 1959 for the famous
Dutch pianist and composer Cor de Groot
with whom Felderhof often performed as a violinist.

Felton attended the public schools and graduated from
the Central High School. His father was a talented musician and a well
known performer upon the concertina, playing lengthy selections for
Wagner, Verdi, Gounod, etc., from memory.
Already as a child William Felton began making little tunes so that at
the age of five he attracted the attention of some musical people. He was
placed under the instruction of William C. Schwartz in piano, and H. A.
Matthews and Henry Houseley in harmony and composition.
After spending some time as the musical director of one of the largest
photo play houses in the United States he resolved to devote all of his
time to musical composition.
Although still a young man he has some fifty compositions to his credit,
many of the most successful being for piano.
Felton's musical inspiration is entirely sane and dwell balanced, without
any foolish striving toward ultra-modernism. Consequently, his work grow and develop upon rational lines. His melodies are
pleasing and with a natural appeal, and his harmonies are tasteful and
well diversified. Among his larger works are the
Concert Polonaise and Second Waltz Caprice. Among the smaller
characteristic pieces, Twilight in Autumn, Blowing Bubbles and
Sunday Morn should be mentioned. Of pieces in lighter vein are his
successful marches, The Color Guard and Passing Parade and
The Wedding Procession, which is published both for two and four
hands.

Fibich was born into a
well-to-do family and enjoyed a more orthodox musical training than his colleagues
Smetana and Dvorak. The years 1865 to 1867 he spent at the Leipzig
Conservatory where he had Richter as teacher in harmony, Jadassohn in
counterpoint and Moscheles in piano.

Salomon Jadassohn
13.08.1831 - 01.02.1902
For more than 30 years
one of the most important
teachers at the Leipzig
Conservatory.

In 1868 he went to Paris for a year to study at
the Conservatoire and he finished his education with Vincent Lachner in
Mannheim after which he returned to his home land (1870).
After a teaching post in Vilna he was appointed second conductor of the
National Theatre and in 1878 he became conductor of the Russian Church in
Prague - a post he held until 1881 when he decided to relinquish all
appointments to devote his time entirely to composing and living a fairly
uneventful life and not much is known about his last years and his death
in 1900.
Fibich composed in all genres: 7 operas, 4 melodramas, Choral works (a
Missa Brevis from 1885), Orchestral works (3 symphonies, 4 overtures, a
suite and 7 symphonic poems). Lesser known are his rather few chamber
music works some piano works and not more than a hand full of songs.
In his symphonic works Fibich shows an ability to evolve a whole symphony
from a tiny motive (like Beethoven) and this makes him unique i Czech
music. So does his harmonic and dynamic originality which sets him in
class of his own.

Fink was son of a priest and
sang as a chorister at Naumburg. after taking his exams from the Latin School
there and some attempts
to become a musician he decided to study theology and history in Leipzig
from 1804 to 1809. But at the same time he worked on with his musical
education and published his first compositions and a very thorough desertion
about time, measure and bars in music.
From 1810 he was helping priest in Leipzig but worked at the same time as
a journalist and redactor of great renown and receiving several honoree
acknowledgements for this.
Soon music took over completely and from 1838 to 1843 he taught at the
University of Leipzig gaining a honorary doctor's degree in 1841 and
becoming Professor of Music in 1842 and being
honorary member in 1847 of Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna,
Leipziger Euterpe and Mannheimer Musik- and Pressburger Church
Music association. He is
remembered for his writings on music history and theory, and his
collections of secular and religious songs.As a music historian Fink showed himself from a sound evolutionary
rather than revolutionary point of viewgaining much respect from
his writings and essays.
Fink has
written an abundance of salon pieces and educational studies but the
greatest part of his output are songs - mostly of religious nature - in
all amounting to
343 opus numbers - among theseMusikalischer
Haus­schatz (Leipzig: 1843) and Die deutsche Liedertafel
(Leipzig: 1846).

His first education was as an
organist and he served for six years at the St. Adalbert's Church after
which he was appointed professor at the Organ School in Prague. After he married
in 1888 he followed his wife to Hamburg where he was professor at the
Conservatory for ten years and when she was engaged to sing in Vienna he
followed her there.
His wife was the singer Berta Foerstrová-Lautererová (1869-1939) who was
Mahler's leading dramatic soprano - especially in Wagner - first in Hamburg
and from 1901 at the Vienna Court Opera.

In Vienna Foerster became
professor at the New Conservatory and music critic at Die Zeit until
the revolution in 1918 when the couple returned to their native land - he as
professor of composition at the Prague Conservatory and from 1922 of the
Master School there.
He has composed in all genres; operas, church music, 5 symphonies, 2 violin
concertos, chamber music, numerous works for piano and songs. Not many of
his works are heard outside his own country today - except perhaps for his
4th symphony Easter Eve.

He was the first
important composer to be educated entirely in America and he was the
first to receive a master's degree in music in USA.
After showing signs of great musicality he was given lesson in piano very
early and when he was 15 he became pupil of Stephen A. Emery at the New
England Conservatory in Boston. In 1874 he graduated from the Harvard
University and started taking lesson from B. J. Lang (piano) and John
Knowles Paine (composition).
Four years later he was appointed organist at the First Unitarian Church
of Boston a post he held for 32 years at the same time composing choral music,
orchestral works and chamber music.
Foote was considered the Dean of American Composers during the
first two decades of the twentieth century and was a leading member of a
group of composers known as the Boston Six or the Second New
England School consisting of John Knowles Paine, Horatio Parker,
George Chadwick, Edward MacDowell, Amy Beach, and Arthur Foote himself. He
is considered to have written the first substantial body of indigenous
concert hall, or classical, music in America.

For a composer whose
royalties would today have brought him millions Foster was a complete
tragedy - dying in a hotel with only 38 cents in his pocket and a note
saying Dear friends and gentle hearts. His brother Henry described
the accident in the New York theater-district hotel that led to his death:
confined to bed for days by a persistent fever, Stephen tried to call a
chambermaid, but collapsed, falling against the washbasin next to his bed
and shattering it, which gouged his head. It took three hours to get him to
the hospital, and in that era before transfusions and antibiotics, he
succumbed after three days.
For Danish readers it should be remembered that while Oh! Susanna
and De Campton Races are easily recognized as American songs one of the
so-called most typical Danish summer songs, Se det summer af sol
over engen is in fact Stephen Foster's melody, Gentle Annie.

Frey was a student of Clara
Schumann, Immanuel Gottlob Friedrich Faiszt (1823-1894) and Brahms (as far
as you could claim to be a pupil of Brahms). From 1887 to 1893 he was musician to
Prince Alexander of Hesse after which he in 1902 became Professor of Music of the
Syracuse University.

Friedman had his general
musical education at Crakow
and was at the same time a piano student of Flora Grzwinska before going
to Vienna to join the classes of Leschetizky. At first he was turned down by
the great teacher and told to go find another job but he stayed on for four
years becoming one of his greatest pupils.
At the same time Friedman took lessons in composition with Guido Adler in
Vienna and Hugo Riemann in Leipzig. After his debut he toured all over the
world gaining fame and esteem everywhere as one of the truly great and
original virtuosos with a colossal
technique and a easily recognizably touch and grand style.
His more than 90 compositions are mainly for the piano and his miniatures
were once very popular. At the same time his editions of Chopin's works
for Breitkopf & Härtel and of Schumann's for Universal Editions became
standards which still are being used.

Friedman at the piano

Fortunately his mastery is preserved through his many recordings - among
these are also two rather interesting interviews where Friedman speaks (in
a charming but most extraordinary English) about Paderewski (as
musician, personality and statesman) and about Chopin.

Fumagalli came from a very
musical family - there were in all four brothers who were musicians and
composers: Disma (1826-1893), Adolfo, Polibio (1830-1901) and Luca
(1837-1908).
Adolfo attended the Milan Conservatory as a pupil of a well-respected
teacher Angeloni and made his debut as a pianist in 1848 before the
Milanese public making some stir. Now he embarked upon a tour becoming a
famous and brilliant fantasy player - Turin, Paris, Belgium and Denmark -
before returning to Italy in 1856. Upon his return the piano makers' firm
Erard sent him one their pianos (there is obviously nothing new about this
kind of promotion 'stunts'). On 1st May he held a concert but after this
he suddenly fell ill and three days later he died - presumably from
cholera.
Although respected by the critics (one French critic called him -
overreacting a little - the first serious pianist from Italy) and famous
with the public he was no real sensation. But when he introduced his
left-hand pieces (one year before his death) he became just that kind of
sensation and
stunned everybody. Although a little frail or perhaps even feminine looking he
had fingers of steel which astonished the audiences.
Apart from his left-hand pieces Fumagalli composed a lot - all of
drawing-room nature: fantasies on opera tunes, capriccios etc. One piece
of his Les Clochettes op. 21 with orchestra became very popular in
his days. These are (for good reasons) all forgotten today - and he is
solely remembered for his left-hand works - if at all.
His brother Disma Fumagalli went quite the other way - he obviously couldn't get enough hands on the
keyboard - and he wrote a
Divertimento over themes from Verdi's Il Trovatore for eight hands on one
piano. Apart from good technique this piece requires good friendship
and lot of deodorants.

Adolfo Fumagalli (by
Lollett, after A. Greppi)

As I have stated elsewhere,
there have been several explanations for playing with the left hand alone.
I don't think I have mentioned smoking a cigar, but perhaps this was the
real reason for Fumagalli's pioneering works for the left hand. After all
- Fumare is the Italian word for to smoke.
The small devils on the
keyboard suggest that he is playing the Robert le Diable Fantasy.
Warning: Don't jump to any conclusion once you notice that on both
pictures his left eye is larger than the right one. Trust me - that is
quite normal - every artist knows that.